Crosscultural Leadership

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Cross-cultural Leadership
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Deep-Level Diversity National Cultural
Differences

• Different value orientations across cultures
• Broad belief systems that guided our behaviors
  and judgments
• Despite globalizations, differences between
  cultures are not disappearing quickly

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Kluckholm Strodtbecks Value Orientations
 
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Work Values Across Cultures(Hofstede Bond)
Individualism vs. Collectivism Uncertainty
Avoidance Power Distance Masculinity vs.
Femininity (Career Success vs. Quality of
Life) Confucian Dynamism
Geert Hofstedes Analysis of Country Cultures
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Other Values that Affect Work Behavior

• Universalism vs. particularism principles vs.
  relationships guide decisions/actions
• Monochronicity vs. polychronicity sense of
  time linearity vs. non-linearity
• High vs. low context context gives meaning or
  not

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GLOBE Study Background

• 170 researchers working for over ten years
  collecting and analyzing data on cultural values
  and leadership practices
• 17,000 managers in 62 societal cultures
• 10 culture clusters were developed from the 62
  societal cultures
• Nine cultural dimensions uncovered

www.thunderbird.edu/wwwfiles/ms/globe/
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GLOBE Study Societal Clusters

• Confucian Asia
• Sub-Saharan Africa
• Middle East
• Southern Asia
• Eastern Europe

• Anglo
• Nordic Europe
• Germanic Europe
• Latin Europe
• Latin America

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GLOBE Study Cultural Attributes

• Performance Orientation
• Assertiveness
• Future Orientation
• Humane Orientation
• Institutional Collectivism

• In-Group Collectivism
• Gender Egalitarianism
• Power Distance
• Uncertainty Avoidance

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GLOBE Study Cultural Leadership Profiles

• Charismatic/Value-Based
• Team-Oriented
• Participative

• Humane-Oriented
• Autonomous
• Self-Protective

Contribute to outstanding leadership in most
countries
Impedes outstanding leadership in most countries
Differences among cultures in whether it
contributes, impedes or is neutral to outstanding
leadership
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Limitations of Reliance on Cultural Values

• These are generalizations---inaccurate and
  sometimes dangerous to apply to any one
  individual
• They are first best guesses prior to learning
  more about the culture
• They should be consciously held to allow for
  learning and modification to occur

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Four strategies for meeting global challenges

• Encourage aspatial careers (spend working lives
  in multiple cultures)
• Awareness building assignments (3-12 month
  assignments)
• SWAT Teams (short term deployment of experts to
  solve problems)
• Virtual solutions and global human resource
  information systems